Disco Fruit is a Serbian label founded in 2014 by Milos Djordjevic aka Tonbe. The label hand-picks the juiciest disco, house and funk cuts to satisfy any groover’s appetite. Disco Fruit is home to a sweet selection of artists including: Loshmi, Mitiko, Hotmood, Dr Packer, 84Bit, Evil Smarty, C. Da Afro, Tonbe and more. Disco Fruit’s sister label is house label, Hellcat Tunes. Tasty.
Review: The titles here might suggest a re-edits EP but rest assured the five tracks ARE actually original, albeit sample-based, productions. 'Step Off The Train', for instance, does indeed bite EBTG's 'Missing' as you'd expect, but simply takes a two-line vocal snip and loops it up over a slo-mo grinder that sits right on the deep house/nu-disco cusp, while 'Oops Upside' is another house/disco fusion that draws not on The Gap Band but on a female-sung cover thereof. So let's not worry about sources and inspirations and just say these are five classy midtempo groovers that'll suit more discerning nu-disco floors down to the ground.
Review: There are producers out there who'll spend months agonising over a snare sound or a clap, and who'll turn out maybe two or three tracks a year. At the other end of the spectrum are artists like Tonbe, who are seemingly capable of knocking together an album's worth of material by lunchtime, and frequently do! Both approaches can, of course, turn up gold - in this case, see the wonky Hammond shuffle that is 'Funker', or the summery good-time funk of 'Pontiac GTO'. This latest offering also finds Tonbe exploring poppier territory on cuts like 'Sugar' and 'Don't Let Me Go'.
Review: Here's one of those releases that really doesn't need a lot of explaining - anyone with even a passing interest in nu-disco should be more than familiar with all four artists involved, as well as the label! Hotmood brings the 70s vibes on the string-drenched, guitar-flecked 'You Are A Star', C Da Afro fast-forwards to the 80s boogie era with the shiny-suited 'So Good For Me', while Loshmi arguably gets the most inventive, mixing up Afro, Latin and spy movie soundtrack vibes on 'Regah'. It's the lazy, laidback funk/jazz-funk of Mitiko's 'Back To Dance', though, that takes the gold.
Review: This is at least the tenth album-length release that Montenegro's Sascha Mitich has produced for Serbian label Disco Fruit, a work rate rivalled only by label boss Tonbe (AKA Loshmi). As ever, the seven tracks featured here blur the lines between re-edits and sample-based productions, with the energetic, good time Afro-tropical vibes of 'Desperately' (think Barrabas, Osibisa) the standout for this reviewer, and the Hammond-sporting (and fairly self-explanatory) 'Foot Stompin' Music' a close second. A lounge-y cover of Stevie Wonder classic 'Ma Cherie Amour' may prove a little more Marmite ("you either love it or hate it"), but isn't without its charms.
Review: The trouble with Tonbe is you've no sooner finished reviewing one long-player than the next one arrives! With such a prolific output, it's all the more wonder that the Serbian nu-disco stalwart manages to maintain the quality standard - but make no mistake, quality is what you get here. One or two tracks (eg opener 'Live My Life') veer a little too far down the pop route, but just check out the strutty 'This Is Party', euphoric Hammond workout 'Change The Mood' or the jazz-tastic closing triptych that begins with 'Keep On Moving, Keep On Grooving' and you'll surely agree that Tonbe is a rare talent indeed.
Review: Turns out Milos Djordjevic, AKA Serbian re-edit king Loshmi, has something of an Eddy Grant fixation. He must have, because two of the Guyanese-British reggae star's tracks get a Loshmi makeover here - namely 'Rampage' and 'Boys In The Street'. Elsewhere, 'No Way' is another reggae edit, 'Across The Floor' and 'In The Club' draw on unidentified boogie sources, Jimmy Bo Horne's 'Is It In' from 1980 gets reworked as 'Yes It Is', Salsoul Orchestra get the treatment on 'Right Size' and - perhaps tread carefully with this one! - 'Neon Rider' revisits the theme to a certain 80s TV series starring The Hoff...
Review: Prolific Montenegrin producer Mitiko (real name Sasha Mitich) will need no introduction to nu-disco lovers by now, and here he brings us seven more very playable nuggets on a release you can call an EP or LP as you see fit! 'Are You Ready' revisits Fatback Band's classic 'Do The Bus Stop' - serviceably if perhaps a little unnecessarily - while Marley/Clapton classic 'I Shot The Sheriff' gets covered (not re-edited) inna disco style; the other five cuts are similarly 70s-themed, with the slow-moving, sleazy funk of 'On Ya' leading the charge for this reviewer on the strength of that squelch bassline alone.
Review: Serbia's Milos Dordevic, AKA Tonbe/Loshmi, proves his mastery of the nu-disco game in just two tracks here! Submission 1: opener 'Easy Dancin', which has a wistful female vocal, spacey Dave Lee-esque Rhodes doodles and, most importantly, what is possibly the greatest stab ever recorded (check it at 0:32). Submission 2: 'Ram Tam Tam', which (after another excellent stab) centres around a rising Hammond riff that never quite resolves - ideal for building energy levels to fever pitch just before you drop that "right, everyone up!" anthem. Four more solid nu-disco/boogie cuts are just the icing on what's already a pretty unmissable cake.
Review: The 70s force is strong in this one... listen to this latest full-length collection from Montenegran producer Sasha Mitich, AKA Mitiko, and you may have to remind yourself, as this writer did, that you're actually listening to a brand new album and not a set of re-edits! There are no spangly Nang-esque synths here, no wonked-out Italo-cosmic excursions, just seven slabs of fat-assed funk ('Real Nasty'), lavish disco-soul ('Thank You For Tonight') and, perhaps most interestingly, a couple of tracks ('Lay Down On Me', 'Universal Love') that lean towards a mellower, more 'crossover' style ? la Bill Withers or The Bellamy Brothers.
Review: There's a lot to admire about Tonbe's boundary-blurring, edit-not-edit releases on Disco Fruit, particularly the attractiveness of the material on offer and their good-value nature. His latest release, Always Like This, naturally ticks both of these boxes, cannily combinig elements of good-time house, electrofunk, jazz-funk and nu-disco. There's no weak links, just 10 party-hearty treats to savour. Our picks of a very strong bunch include the bouncy disco-house cheeriness of 'Days Like These', the bustling jazz-house beats and tidy organ stabs of 'Raw & Dirty', the Clavinet-sporting, cowbell-laden stomp of 'Shake That Booty' and the classic, late '80s NYC garage-house goodness of 'Without You'. Instant fun-times.
Review: Prolific Montenegran producer Sasha Mitich, better known to disco lovers as Mitiko, returns to his regular home of Disco Fruit with, incredibly, his third full-length release of the year, following June's 'Disko Diss' and September's 'Best Of'. Things get off to a flying start with the stunning 'Akugen', as deep house, disco and Balearica collide in the heart of the rain forest. Elsewhere, cuts like 'It's A Long Ride' and 'Living After Time' have a more soulful feel, 'Now I Can See' is a dubby late-night groove, and 'Tour De Happiness' and 'Looking Back' house things up a little, making for a varied and enjoyably listen all round - though 'Akugen' remains the stone-cold killer.
Review: Serbia's Disco Fruit label offer digital buyers another high-VFM collection of tracks that were previously only available on wax, with the album's 31 cuts coming from just six artists including scene faves Tonbe and Loshmi and label regular Evil Smarty. Between them, they run the gamut from scorching, bottom-heavy funk (Evil Smarty's 'The Get Down', Dave Allison's 'Ain't Nuthin To It', Loshmi's 'Drugstore') to deep n' soulful house (Tonbe's 'Broken Heart'), via Gradient Logic's glacial boogie nouveau and jazzier cuts like Dave Allison's 'Trade Off' and Tonbe's 'Something Jazzy'. It's more one for the jazzbos and funkateers than outright disco dollies, admittedly, but on the whole that's probably a good thing...
Review: Serbia's Disco Fruit bring us a digital collection of tracks that were (mostly) previously only available on wax. Label boss Tonbe supplies four of 'em, and with most of the rest coming from equally familiar names such as Dr Packer, Hotmood, Mitiko and Loshmi, you know the bar's set high! Stylistically, the album ranges from authentic-sounding low-slung funkers like Hotmood's 'Let's Ride' and Tonbe's 'Gem Picker' to the breezy uptempo soul of 84Bit's 'Mamma Jamm' and the boogie nouveau of Dr Packer & Loshmi's 'In Case Of Emergency', while special shout-outs go to Evil Smarty, who almost out-Fatbacks Fatback, and to Mitiko's excellent reworking of the mighty Janet.
Review: Montenegrin producer/re-editor Sasha Mitich, better known as Mitiko, has been extremely prolific since emerging onto the scene around five years ago, reliably turning out a new album-length EP every few months - which has left him with a rich back catalogue to plunder for this 'best of' compilation. Most of the tracks here would appear to be re-edits rather than original productions, but if so then he's dug admirably deep - there are reworks of cuts by Sister Sledge, Janet Jackson and Kool & The Gang ('Celebremos' was the band's own Spanish-language version of 'Celebration'), but most of the other source material escapes us. Which, of course, just makes this set sound all the fresher!
Review: Here we have four more sure-fire bullets for your disco machine gun, coming courtesy of Serbia's Disco Fruit label. Mexico's Hotmood is up first with the fairly self-explanatory 'I Love To Boogie', which is followed by 'The Groove To Make You Dance', a reworking of T-Connection's 1977 TK Disco classic 'Groove To Get Down' by Guildford's own re-edit don Evil Smarty. Montenegran producer Sasha Mitich, AKA Mitiko, then takes liberties with Janet Jackson (and gets away with it) on 'What Have You Done For Me', before label co-owner Loshmi plays us out with laidback, headnodding instrumental 'Soul Food'
Review: The words 'funk' and 'funky' are two of most over-used and wantonly misapplied in the entire musical lexicon, but rest assured they're employed entirely appropriately here! 'Funk Off' is an authentically fat n' squelchy, late 70s/early 80s-sounding affair, but with a modern twist - to contemporary ears, that bassline will recall both Daft Punk's 'Da Funk' and Basement Jaxx's 'Remedy'. 'Motherfunker' operates in similar territory, but with something of a Compass Point-like swing to the bass and topline hints of 'Ashes To Ashes'-era Bowie, while Tonbe provides a rerub of the latter that packs a heftier kick, presumably to enable smoother transition onto house floors.
Review: Since a young age, Montenegro-based Mitiko has shown a great passion for music. 10 years ago his productions began to surface, many tracks in the vein of nu-disco and deep house found on such labels as Fruity Flavor and Cherry Cola Records - and of course his very own Disco Fruit. Following up his previous long player from last month entitled 'Summer' he's already back into the groove with 'My Sugar', featuring a fine collection of sweltering edits. From the roaring vocals on the uplifting "Can't Wait No Longer", the neon-lit '80s pop vibe of "Hold Me", the slo-mo boogie down feels of the title track and last but not least - an oldie but a goodie to be heard on "Straight To Your Arms".
Review: Fresh from impressing via a first outing on Hot Digits, Tonbe returns to his own imprint, Disco Fruit, with an overflowing picnic basket of summery dancefloor treats. The emphasis throughout is on musical warmth, with elements borrowed from a variety of lesser-known jazz-funk, disco and electrofunk cuts combining well with the producer's own deep house sounds and largely club-focussed drums. The results are uniformly entertaining and enjoyable, with highlights including the boogie fizz of "Always There", the Bongo-riffic West Coast deep house bounce of "Freaky Situation", the carnival-ready roll of "Latina" and the Chimes style breakbeat soul heat of "Stick Together".
Review: Montenegran producer Sasha Mitich returns to Serbia's Disco Fruit with his second album proper, which follows 2018's 'Disko Adriatiko'. We're in nu-disco/disco-house territory as opposed to straight-up 70s pastiche - in fact it's 80s boogie/electrofunk, rather than 70s disco per se, that's the most obvious influence, particularly on cuts like 'Pray For Another Day'. But the album's perhaps at its most interesting when it crosses over into other musical pastures: there's some fine jazz-funk playing to be heard on Ronnie Laws/Incognito cover 'Always There', for instance, while the standout for this reviewer is jazz-fuelled deep houser 'Sound Of The Rain' - think St Germain jamming with the Average White Band!
Review: It would be fair to say that Tonbe is pretty prolific. Since his last outing on Disco Fruit - the label he founded and runs, remember - in March (2020), the Serbian producer has made numerous outings on Little Jack, Zero Eleven and Puro Music. Given this release schedule you'd expect "For My People", his latest mini-album on Disco Fruit, to be a bit flabby, but it's genuinely another hit-filled treat. Our picks of a very strong bunch of disco, boogie and house-flavoured reworks include the "2020 Mix" of "For My People", a sax and jazzy bass guitar-dominated dancefloor treat, the hazy Balearic disco warmth of "Easy Summer Wind", the pulsating P-funk bounce of "Thankful" and the chunky, percussion-rich peak-time goodness of "Dobar Groove".
Review: Something of a departure for Mitiko here: a regular on Disco Fruit, the Montenegran producer is best known for disco and boogie vibes that pay very faithful homage to the sounds of the 70s and 80s, but on this five-tracker he takes a left turn into Latin music territory. Disco jocks who favour rhythmic workouts over serotonin-rush diva vocals will find this an EP that's worth exploring, and while its appeal to the disco beards in cities such as Manchester or Berlin may be somewhat limited, that's certainly not gonna be the case in party destinations like Miami, Ibiza or Mexico.
Review: For his last outing on Disco Fruit, Montenegro-based Mitiko served up some "Naughty Things". On his return to the label, he's decided to share his "Beach View". It's a fine vista which naturally comes accompanied by the kind of warm, sun-kissed re-edits that will sound suitably saucy blasting out of the windows of locked-down houses this summer. Highlights are plentiful, from the low-slung, delay-laden Stevie Wonder revision that kicks things off ("Come Back Once More"), to drowsy, synth-laden jazz-funk-meets-electrofunk goodness of "To The Boogie Found", via the grandiose disco stomp of "How Sweet It Used To Be" and the pitched-down, R&B-goes-house warmth of closing cut "How I Feel".
Review: Fresh from the market, Disco Fruit offers up a suitably large pallet of juicy re-edits, tasty revisions and sun-ripened reworks. As you'd expect, there's plenty to get your teeth into from start to finish. Our highlights include the fuzzy 21st century disco-funk of Brian SNR's "Down For Some Loving", the bouncy, synth-bass-propelled funkiness of C Da Afro's "Music Is Love", the sleazy sweatiness of Frank Virgilio's flash-fried "Thick As A Brick (The ReThink)", the throbbing goodness of Loshmi's Italo-disco/80s rock revision "Palm Springs", the mid-tempo disco bliss of Mitiko's "It's Over, It's Over" and the disco-house bump of Tonbe's "Make It Last Forever".
Review: It's only been five months since Disco Fruit overlord Tonbe (real name Milos Djordjevic) offered up his fourth full-length excursion, but he's already offering up album number five. The Serbian producer begins with a squelchy synth-funk cover of Queen Classic "Another One Bites The Dust" (renamed "Another Bite") and ends with the cowbell-laden nu-boogie smoothness of "Sunny August"; in between, you'll find a fine selection of colourful, synth-heavy workouts that successfully blend bold melodies and ear-catching chords with beats that variously touch on house, disco, Italo, freestyle and electro. It's a coherent and entertaining set with plenty of dancefloor-ready club cuts for all those who dig melody-driven nu-disco.
Review: Montenegro's own disco don Mitiko clearly isn't a subscriber to the "less is more" theory: since 2016 he's put out no fewer than nine albums, all on Disco Fruit, and now here comes number 10. Don't expect any huge, groundbreaking innovation here: faithful homages, not sonic experiments, are Mitiko's stock-in-trade. But from the chuggy, laidback 'Nights Near The Fire' to the 80s boogie of 'Having Any Doubts' and 'Standing On The Line', and from the jazz-funk groove of 'On The Rock' to the unabashed cheesy/novelty vibe of 'Bad Man Of The West', it's all well executed and authentic-sounding, making this an enjoyable listen all the same.
Review: 2019 was a busy year for 84bit, a producer who released a mixture of deep house and nu-disco jams on a variety of largely digital-only labels. "Mamma Jamma" is his debut for Disco Fruit and features a number of notable cuts. Chief amongst these is the title track, a bustling, bass-heavy chunk of booming disco-house that's subsequently taken in a funkier direction by the ubiquitous Dr Packer, Hotmood and Tonbe, whose fine revision is looser, warmer and baggier. The EP also boasts two versions of "HN": an electric piano-laden original mix that expertly joins the dots between elecro, funk breaks and disco-funk, and a bubbly nu-disco revision by label regular Mitko.
Review: Astonishingly, Loshmi's long-running "Serious Edits" series is now 15 volumes deep. We can happily confirm that he's not run out of steam yet with the seven-track selection featuring some suitably playable, floor-friendly revisions that are well worth your hard-earned cash. Our highlights include the gently housed-up 80s disco goodness of "Delightful", the heavy disco-funk/proto-rap fusion of "Funky Animals" - all eccentric mic flow, mazy organ lines and beefed-up disco grooves - and the languid, glassy-eyed loveliness of head-nodding warm up gem "Soul Food". There's naturally plenty to set the pulse elsewhere across the EP, too, so give all of the clips a listen if you have time.
Review: "Street Groove" sees Disco Fruit's most prolific producers - Serbian boss man Tonbe and Montenegro-based hero Mitiki - join forces on a seven-track collection of brand new tunes that cannily combine elements of deep house, nu-disco and '90s style U.S house. Our highlights include the aptly named house retro-futurism of "Something Jazzy", the bounding, bass-heavy haziness of title track "Street Groove", the colourful nu-disco/deep house fusion of "Feels So Good" and the slap-bass propelled wonder that is "I Think You Like", where bongo-heavy hand percussion and bumpin' house drums combine to create an energy packed peak-time mood.
Review: Montenegro-based groove lord Mitiki is in a celebratory mood on his latest Disco Fruit re-edit outing. He gleefully skips between the beefed-up Spanish language disco cheeriness of "Celebremas" - a rework of a cover of Kool & The Gang's "Celebrate" - and the Clavinet-happy disco-funk muscularity of K.I.D tweak "Do It Again", before charging towards disco-house dancefloors via the beefed-up sweetness of "Love Somebody Today". The pie-eyed, smiling fun continues via the delicious disco-funk party vibes of "Ohio" and closing cut "To The Top", a chunky, horn-toting revision of another sing-along disco workout.
Review: Here's a record that doesn't sound like it should have been made in Serbia but definitely was, as Milos Djordjevic, better known as Tonbe (or sometimes Loshmi), returns to his own Disco Fruit label with album number four. 'I Don't Belong To You' kicks things off in fine brass-parpin' style and 'Use Your Imagination' brings the album to a close with sprightly bass, whistling synths and a spoken female vocal, while in-between you'll find eight more tracks ranging from non-cheesy disco-house ('I Want To Hear This') to west coast-ish funk ('Shake Their Bodies'), with Zapp-esque squelchy synth basslines and vocodered vox much in evidence throughout.
Review: Although he's contributed numerous tracks to recent compilations, this three-tracker from Frank Virgilio is actually the enthusiastic label-hopper's first single since the spring. He begins by applying his magic touch to a prime slice of horn-heavy purple funk, wrapping the original's flash-fried guitars, tasty trumpets and scat style vocals around a chunky disco-house style groove. He dips the tempo - but not the floor-friendly intensity - on "Cat In Rio", a low-slung dub disco affair that boasts a suitably heavy bassline and plenty of sun-kissed, samba-soaked synths, while closing cut "Matt's Ring" is a loopy, disco-house style cut-up of Matsubara's "SOS", a jazz-funk/disco fusion classic that used to get regular rotation at David Mancuso's legendary Loft parties.
Review: Get ready to boogie till you drop as Montenegro-based scalpel fiend Mitiko offers up a seven-track selection of lightly beefed-up re-edits. There's plenty of tried-and-tested fun to enjoy, from the chugging, synth-sporting disco-rock antics of "Boogie Till We Drop" and the surging K.I.D rework business of "I'll See It Again", to the low-slung swamp funk sleaziness of "Music Is Her Lover" and the rubbery boogie-soul goodness of slap-bass sporting workout "Won't You Blame Me". Wisely he's included a smattering of superb slow jams, too, with the '80s soul shuffle of "Out Of The Night Time" and slow disco groover "It's Over, It's Over" standing out.
Review: Serbia's Disco Fruit bring us a split EP from two label regulars: Montenegro's Sasha Mitich, better known as Mitiko, and Milos Djordjsevic, better known as prolific re-editor (his 'Serious Edits' compilation series is now up to Vol 11) Loshmi. Mitiko brings us two retro funkers - 'My Shoes', with its infectious wukka-wukking guitar riff, and 'Too Hot To Handle', which marries a sung/rapped male vocal to an 80s sounding synth-woodwind hook. Loshmi, meanwhile, takes us into more Latin-leaning funk territory with 'Portoriko' and 'Pretty Chiquita'. All four are built with the simple aim of moving booties on dancefloors, and all four will do that for sure.
Review: With 15 tracks from nine different artists, this is the first compilation from Disco Fruit, making it the ideal opportunity to get acquainted with the Serbian label - or just great value for money if you're in search of some fine contemporary disco, funk and boogie grooves. Ranging from the sprightly jazz-house of Munky Five's 'Peace Of Jazz' to the Fatback funk of Mike Woods 'Get What You Need Y'All', via the Parliament/Zapp-esque squelch of JB Boogie's 'Party Underground', the attitude-y disco-house strut of Jack Roy & Peitzke's 'On The House' with its Scissor Sisters-ish vocal and Hiva's cheeky 'Superfreak'-biting 'Yea Yeah', there's no shortage of mirror ball goodness here.
Review: Like many of the most recognizable names on the re-edit and nu-disco scenes, Sasha Mitich AKA Mitiko has served up a steady stream of rock solid EPs over the last few years. His latest is typically groovy, atmospheric and floor-friendly with a quartet of killer cuts to get the juices flowing. Opener "Back To Dance" is a lolloping mid-tempo revision of gnarled swamp-funk groover rich in crunchy guitars and hazy horns, while "I Love Your Body" is a deliciously synth-heavy romp through delay-laden drum machine hits, chiming mid-80s melodies, bubbly bass and echoing vocal snippets. Mitich successfully switches mood and tempo on the thrusting Sylvester revision "I Who Have No One" before finishing on a high via the Jam & Lewis style '80s power-pop-soul of closing cut "The Power of Woman".
Review: Serbia's Milos Djordjevic, AKA Loshmi, brings us Vol 14 in his long-running re-edit series, with five tracks covering a range of musical ground. Opening instrumental 'Juice & Boogie' draws on brass-tastic 70s funk (exact source unknown, but there's a strong Blaxploitation soundtrack vibe), while 'El Grande Funk' plunders what would appear to be some heavy Indian sitar funk of the period. 'Very Tough' reworks Angela Bofill's 'Too Tough' from 1983 (ever so slightly!) while another, unknown 80s boogie cut inspires 'Sensual Love'. The standout, though, is 'Palm Springs', a shiny nu-disco jam that makes devastating use of the guitars from Blondie's 'Call Me'.
Review: It's a reflection of Tonbe's impressive productivity that his "Best Of" series has now notched up a third volume. Happily, the quality threshold remains pleasingly high, with the Disco Fruit founder gathering together tried-and-tested re-edits, reworks and original productions that combine rock solid, club-ready grooves with lashings of classic disco, boogie and electrofunk flavour. After kicking things off with the Clavinet-heavy P-funk flex of "Give The Funk", Tonbe giddly sprints through peak-time treats such "Original Tool" (a soaring disco-house workout rich in rubbery slap bass), "I Feel Energy" (all saucer-eyed Rhodes riffs, sun-warm grooves and swooping synth-strings), "Hold Me Tight" (low-slung disco-funk) and "Shoot Me Up" (brightly coloured electrofunk). You'll also find a smattering of slo-mo warm-up gems, with the decidedly loved-up "The Way You Love Me" standing out.
Review: Sasha Mitich is a native of Kotor in Montenegro, and for the past decade he's been delivering a stream of re-edits and original material drawing on his love of classic disco, soul, funk and boogie. Seven such cuts are gathered together on this EP/mini-album, no fewer than three of which - 'What Have You Done For Me', 'Think Of You' and 'Doesn't Know That' are very playable Janet Jackson re-edits. Elsewhere, 'Rising Sun' features some fine cheesy sax work, 'You're My Kind Of Woman' borrows from Sho Nuff's 1980 boogie gem 'It's Alright', the title track has an 80s Miami feel and 'Superstar' reworks Amadeo's 'Moving Like A Superstar' from 1977.
Review: Fresh from lending his sublime scalpel skills to Editorial as part of the label's latest multi-artist extravaganza, C Da Afro returns to Disco Fruit with another tasty two-track missive. The Grecian producer is in predictably fine form on chunky, bass-heavy opener "Music Is Love", where dubbed-out vocal snippets, jazzy guitar motifs, swirling strings and fuzzy organ riffs cluster around a rubbery, all action disco-house groove. "Sugar Love" is an altogether more synth heavy beast, with C Da Afro applying his successful formula - all beefed-up bottom end and excitement building filter sweeps - to a dazzling slab of colourful '80s Euro-boogie goodness.
Review: When it comes to serving up tried-and-tested re-edits with beefed-up bottom end, Disco Fruit main man Tonbe can usually be relied upon to deliver the goods. This EP appears less than three months after his most recent edits album and contains four more reasons to be cheerful. He begins with the rubbery bounce of "Gem Picker", where a deep, trumpet-laden jazz-funk workout is given a gentle house makeover, before sticking a size 12 boot up the backside of what sounds like a Robert Owens-voiced deep house cut. "Rough" is a cheery, horn-heavy romp through European disco-funk pastures, while "Get Loose" sees the Serbian layer sparkling piano riffs and mazy synth lines over a hip-wiggling house beat.
Review: Montenegro's Mitiko is taking a journey "From Paris to NY" and the good news is that we're all invited along for the ride. In typical fashion, the prolific producer's soundtrack is packed to the rafters with club-ready disco workouts guaranteed to get a party going on any Transatlantic flight. Our picks include the Clavinet-heavy disco-funk bounce of "Give It Up", the mid-80s, Fairlight stab-sporting electrofunk madness of "Let It All", the chiming synths and Jam & Lewis style beats of '80s soul revision "The One Who Loves You" and the rolling disco-house bounce of superior title track "From Paris to NY". In other words, it's a veritable smorgasbord of tasty re-edit treats.
Review: Eight re-edits here that, somewhat unusually, draw largely on classic hip-hop rather than the standard old school funk, disco and boogie for inspiration - opener 'Ding Dong', for example, lifts a chunk of vocal from Sequence's Sugarhill classic 'Funk You Up' - though musically we're firmly in disco/house territory. Standouts include 'Burn The Floor' with its infectious P-funk synths and George Clinton-via-Death Row vocal chant, the seriously phat 'n' squelchy 'Real G', and 'In Your Face', which comes on like Ice-T having a go at that oompah-loompah, Balkan-style tech-house that was so popular around 2010 or so.
Review: Even by the standards of the disco edit scene, where producers and scalpel fiends think nothing of chucking out new EPs left, right and centre, Hotmood Man Guillermo Gonzalez is impressively prolific. Unlike some of his contemporaries, though, his high standards never split. There's naturally plenty to admire on this return to Disco Fruit, from the baggy-but-bouncing brilliance of "Afro Vibrations" - all lolloping beats, Fela Kuti style sax solos, layered percussion and rich Afro-funk guitars - to the humid and sun-kissed chug of "Tropical", which appears to mix samples lifted from a cover of a well-known jazz-funk jam with warm and wozzy new instrumentation. Also impressive is "Shiny Stockings", a loopy, boogie-driven jam that sits somewhere between Tiger & Woods and Nang-style nu-disco.
Review: Mitiko's last outing on Disco Fruit, September 2018's "Easy To See", was a particularly expansive and action-packed set. The prolific, Montenegro-based producer seems to have simmered down a little, because this return to Tonbe's popular imprint contains just three tracks. Crucially, though, they all hit the spot. First up is the groovy, electric piano-laden dancefloor sweetness of "You Make Me", whose elastic bassline and fizzing nu-disco synths catch the ear. "Staring Into Blackness" is a slow disco-house chugger built around heavy bass guitar and Meters-style Hammond organ licks, while "Should I Go Now" sees our hero wrap snaking sax lines around another sumptuous, slow-motion groove and suitably Balearic acoustic guitar flourishes.
Review: By anyone's standards, this is a bumper selection of re-edits from Disco Fruit big cheese Tonbe. Amongst the 12 tracks you'll find a head-nodding chunk of horn-heavy funk ("It's Not Over"), a tooled-up peak-time disco-funk smasher ("The Beginning"), some Talkbox-sporting P-funk madness ("Never Enough"), a dash of deep space Italo-disco/electrofunk fusion (the superb "Unreal") and even a big dollop of hands-in-the-air piano house fun (skipping, turn of the '90s workout "I Can't Help Myself" and the slightly deeper but no lass glassy-eyed "Love And Sunshine"). It's the kind of collection that DJs will want to keep on their USB sticks at all times; it's not just the diversity that impresses, but also Tonbe's high quality threshold. Put simply, there's very little filler and plenty of killer cuts.
Review: This undeniably epic set by Brian Basil van Heerden under the familiar Brian Snr alias offers up a handful of unheard cuts and a dizzying array of remixes of previous Disco Fruit singles "She's Superfly" and "Down 4Some Loving". In the former category you'll find "Let's Dance", a hard-wired disco chugger rich in rasping saxophone solos, the piano-sporting disco-funk strut of "Like A Fever" and the low slung dub disco/electrofunk fusion of "Lover's Delight". Remix-wise, we're rather enjoying the stripped back mid-tempo chunkiness of SNR's revision of "She's Superfly", the Clav-happy, slo-mo breakbeat sludge-funk that is Mitiko's remix of "Down 4 Some Loving" and C Da Afro's electrofunk take on the same track. That said, the quality threshold remains high throughout.
Review: Serbia's Disco Fruit Records present a 15-track collection packed with disco, nu-disco and disco-house goodness. It's very much an in-house affair - label boss Tonbe contributes two tracksm while Disco Fruit regular Mitiko is behind a further six - which makes the general standard of what's on offer even more impressive. Highlights include Mitiko's boogie-ish 'Do You Really Want My Love?', Loshmi's gloriously camp, Euro-inspired 'Easy Night Drive', Hotmood's lazy, low-slung 'Let's Ride' and Tonbe's phat-assed jazz-funker 'That Sample', while special mention should be made of Kellini's 'No Balance' which, to older ears, is Animotion's 'Obsession' in disguise.
Review: Disco Fruit's latest two-track missive sees label regular Loshmi join forces with Glitterbox regular and disco remixer to the stars Dr Packer. First up is "A Case of Emergency", which sounds like a tidied up, extra-fresh revision of a sparkling '80s soul/electrofunk jam full of addictive synth bass, sing-along chorus vocals, chiming melodies and twinkling pianos. Equally as impressive is accompanying cut-job "House In Downtown", another '80s soul style revision blessed with funk-fuelled boogie bass guitar, spacey synthesizer flourishes, life-affirming brass blasts and a vaguely familiar lead vocal that will have dancers singing along in unison. Proper party music for those who like their dancefloor grooves to come accompanied by shoulder pads, Jheri curls and a side order of cherry wine.
